Millennium Baby showed at the Corpus Playroom from the 18th to the 21st October 2023.

Kerrie Portman

Millennium Baby, written by Cambridge’s Alix Addinall, explores the themes of coming of age during the “unprecedented times” shaping many of our formative years. Whilst many of us will have our own memories of Brexit, Trump’s presidency, the Covid-19 pandemic and a seemingly never ending stream of Prime Ministers, seeing a fictional character suffering through these same events adds a beneficial level of distance. One of the peculiarities of theatre is seeing a live person go through vulnerable private moments, something the lead actor; Imogen Woods-Wilford, playing Robin, does with admirable talent and heart wrenching skill. The actors are already positioned on stage in the Corpus Playroom once the atrium opens and the audience walk into the theatre,with Robin lying on her bed, scrolling her phone: the bed a piece of fur niture which takes centre stage throughout the play, as it did in many people’s lives during the pandemic.  There’s instant intimacy which is later expanded on, in a play full of emotional vulnerability. 

The play is interspersed  with poetic monologues where protagonist Robin describes her worsening mental health and growing fear of the world around her. Memories of her friends sharing their hopes for the future, anxieties around needing to do well in their GCSEs, and exploring the newness of boyfriends, sex and drinking- the newness of youth- are cut off as her mind warps these memories into her friends embodying her inner critique. Her friends spew insults at her before fading into the lost abyss of her memory. The waves of Robin’s mood are cleverly mirrored in the play’s soundscape, designed by Hattie Burns. Ocean waves can often be heard over the speakers, serving not only as a metaphor for her emotional state but also a reminder to the audience, listening to unseen and just-out-of-reach nature, of the time during lockdowns, of being locked inside, longing to be outside. The set design was largely white and sterile, matching the overarching theme of the pandemic. As Robin’s life and mental state change, so does the level and maturity of the mess, cluttering and breaking the sterility. As her friend group are newly eighteen, the litter becomes cans and vodka bottles – although a few years later, Robin needs to search for a bottle opener when a love interest comes over, a date that offers to help her clean the mugs growing mould, or, as they playfully put it, fulfilling her undiscovered dreams of being a microbiologist breeding eco-systems.

The Brexit Referendum may have been voted on, Trump’s pregnancy ended in court and the Lockdowns and restrictions of Covid-19 passed, but the effects of living through these events during our formative years left stains on our lives. Through Millennium Baby, Addinall takes the audience by the hand and leads us, briefly and safely, back into those ‘unprecedented times’.

Image Credits: Publicity photograph of the Millennium Baby cast